The Flames of His Mind
by tocasia
Summary: Cloud dreams about what could have gone differently in Nibelheim. But would any of it have helped?


**The Flames of His Mind**

by the infamous and notorious tocasia

 **Characters:** Sephiroth, Cloud, Tifa, no pairings

 **Rating:** T

 **Warnings/Tags:** canon-typical ellipses abuse, time travel, mindgames, dark, #sailthecosmos, 'Inn'd of the Line'(breaks), I reject your reality and substitute my own, I'm so sorry Cloud

post-AC, no CC

Cloud knows deep in his heart, from experience, the way that reality transforms into memory... and also... the way memory can become reality. Cloud tries to change what happened in Nibelheim, but...

Written on 4/30/2017. I think I may have to atone but I don't know how.

 **Disclaimer:** I don't own FF7 and I make no profit from this work.

* * *

Tifa had left the lights on for him, even though the Seventh Heaven was closed for the night. It had been a long day. Cloud cleaned his dusty boots on the mat and entered quietly. The tables were neat, the chairs stacked carefully on top of them. A quick check behind the counter reassured him that nothing was out of order.

When Cloud was halfway up the stairs, he heard Tifa playing the piano, so softly. She played well. He knew she'd heard him come home, but he waited outside the room until she finished. It was a song he didn't recognize.

She looked up at him and smiled the way she always did. "Welcome home, Cloud! How was your day?"

"It was okay," he replied. "There wasn't any trouble with monsters. I finally got that shipment to the construction site, you know, the parts for the wind turbines that they're building out in the wastes. I delivered some letters that people seemed happy to receive. Oh and... Yuffie asked me to say hi. Her materia business has been doing really well since the road is clear now."

"We've had a lot more customers here, too," Tifa said. "It's nice when they talk about how things are improving. Today a woman told me that she'd come all the way from Junon to visit relatives in Kalm. Most of the damage to the harbor has already been repaired. She thinks shipping to Costa del Sol will resume within the year."

Cloud smiled at that. People were rebuilding the good things, it was encouraging. Everyone was trying their best to recover after... everything that happened.

"Tifa... Have you ever wondered..."

"About what?"

"What if... we could change what happened... in the past? Knowing how things turned out in the end, could we fix it for the better? So that we, everyone... wouldn't need to just pretend that everything is alright..."

Tifa shook her head, surprised. She'd thought the same thing sometimes, but to actually hear the question... "Cloud... Of course I have, but... back then, we were fighting just to survive. We did everything we could. We must have. We never gave up fighting for the future."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. It's just... today on the delivery route I passed the memorial again..."

Tifa crossed the room to comfort Cloud with a gentle hug. "I know. It's hard for me too. Everywhere around us... the ruins of Midgar, the red ash of the sunsets, the memories of what we lost. I... don't think it will ever go away."

Cloud noticed she was holding back tears and held her close. The past... It was something they'd both cried over many times. He knew they'd probably never escape the dreams... and the nightmares.

No, it would never go away. But there were things he would change if he could.

* * *

Cloud almost wished his day had been longer. He wasn't tired enough to fall asleep yet, and so he had time to think. That made the dreams worse. Most of the time they didn't make sense. He'd have been worried if they had, because maybe that would mean...

 _I will never be..._

No, they were just normal dreams.

This time it was Nibelheim again. The beginning of the nightmare, for Cloud, for Tifa, for very nearly the entire world. He never wanted to, but he dreamed about it often. It was an obsession he'd never admit to his waking self. He wanted to be rid of it. If only there was something he could change. Something to make the intense heat of the flames just...

 _...a memory._

It was a personal wish, but far from a selfish one. If he had been able to stop Sephiroth back then, life would almost certainly be better today. All the days after, too, since then... he might trust the world to stay saved.

Cloud knows deep in his heart, from experience, the way that reality transforms into memory... and also... the way memory can become reality.

Cloud's reality is the one he reconstructed with Tifa's help, after Mideel. It's what actually happened at Nibelheim... to him... to Zack... to the person he had wanted Tifa to be proud of...

You can't change the past.

 _You've never even..._

Can you?

 _...thought about it._

* * *

This dream is vivid and very much like the real thing. It's one of those dreams where he's simply an observer, watching, detached, powerless, as the scene plays out below him. He hates that. He decides that's the first part of the dream that will change. And then... what else can change?

Cloud regrets that he hid his face back then. He wouldn't do that now, now that he knows how much Tifa cares about him. She probably wouldn't have considered it a broken promise that he'd come back without making SOLDIER yet. It would have been nice to see her and tell her about the places he'd already traveled to.

So he walks into his hometown boldly, proud of what he has done instead of embarrassed about what he hasn't done yet.

He doesn't find Tifa anywhere in town. The next day when she guides them up the mountain to the reactor, there is just no time to talk. Events do not change. The bridge gives out, the other infantryman is left behind, the natural Mako fountain is beautiful, the reactor... isn't just a reactor. Nibelheim burns.

* * *

Cloud wakes to find that he's kicked all the covers off the bed. He goes to get a glass of water and then rearranges the blankets. He has a busy schedule tomorrow and needs the rest, even if it won't be very good. He drifts off to sleep. But he hasn't been awake long enough, and he finds himself back in the same dream.

* * *

The cold air of the mountains... it was no different. This time, Cloud had made it into SOLDIER. He'd made First Class. It had not been easy, but victory was sweet. His mom had been so proud when he'd sent mail back to Gongaga.

...what?

Dreams don't have to make sense. Cloud remembered bits and pieces of what Zack had gone through in training. The memories were still... jumbled up. But if Cloud had actually made it as a SOLDIER, wouldn't he be able to do something different at Nibelheim? He'd be strong enough to...

No... Zack had been there at the time. He'd been that strong and maybe he and Sephiroth had even been friends and still he... hadn't been able to stop what happened.

* * *

Cloud tried again. What about that blasted transport? That ride over the bumpy mountain roads... Shiva, he'd been so sick! Anything bad that happened to that truck would be his sweet salvation. If they never made it to Nibelheim, Sephiroth couldn't...

The truck broke down. It didn't change anything. They marched for two days uphill over rugged terrain and arrived outside town and fought that dragon. The fight went the same way he remembered, the parts he'd been conscious for, anyway. From his vantage point in the dream, only half there, he looked upon his past self with... pity.

Cloud's hometown burned to the ground, just as before. Events continued the way they always had, to Midgar, to AVALANCHE, to their journey across the Planet, to the... Northern Cave? The dream hadn't ever gone that far before.

Cloud kept making little alterations each time the dream repeated itself, quieting his past regrets. The small things were easy to think of and easy to fix, one at a time or in any combination. Unfortunately, he didn't seem to be able to choose what his dream self wanted to change next. He was no closer to preventing disaster. He needed to try something more drastic.

* * *

The morning light streams through the curtains, still too soft to cast shadows, but strong enough to wake him up. Cloud's alarm hasn't gone off yet. He checks the bedside clock. Thirty more minutes...

* * *

This wasn't working. But now Cloud was certain he was dreaming, and he was doing it on purpose. Surely, he'd have more control now.

Maybe... Vincent? If Cloud woke him back then... Vincent was pretty strong, he'd probably be able to help. It wasn't difficult, while he was visiting family and friends, to check out the mansion earlier than before. And Cloud already knew about the secret passage, and the spiral stairs, and... the lab...

Cloud watched the dream flow through several possible scenarios. Sometimes, Vincent wouldn't wake up, or he'd go right back to sleeping off his sins, or he wouldn't listen. Sometimes Vincent would talk to Sephiroth in the library, or he'd come with them to the reactor. Once, Vincent had helped evacuate the town and everyone had survived the fire. Cloud had been hopeful about that one until Hojo showed up. He and Zack hadn't escaped the lab that time.

Still, in dream logic, that meant... there existed a reality in which the townspeople (his mother!) lived even when the town burned, and something different had happened to him. So, change was possible.

* * *

His earlier feelings of helplessness in his own dream had thus far discouraged Cloud from even considering confronting Sephiroth directly. It just wasn't a good idea, even if none of this was real. But maybe that's what it would take...

This time, SOLDIER First Class Cloud Strife boldly returned to his hometown after riding in a comfortable van that had great suspension. He didn't pass out at the mere sight of a dragon. He read the papers in the library before Sephiroth did. He understood the writing even though it twisted in and out of focus, the characters unrecognizable, sometimes missing entirely. Dreams are like that.

Cloud hadn't read very many scientific journals in his life, and he didn't remember Zack knowing much about that either. But he was pretty sure that this stuff would receive a failing grade in any university. The poorly translated instructions for assembling that nice little coffee table he'd bought for Tifa made more sense. He'd seen grocery lists written better than this. The dates weren't even consistent.

There was no way in hell that something hidden in these words could have driven Sephiroth to madness. Not by itself.

Cloud realized that he'd been reading too long. He heard footsteps in the hallway. He hadn't woken Vincent this time around, so...

"Cloud! So this is where you've been all day!" It was Zack. That was a relief. "When you didn't report back last night... We've been searching for you around town while trying not to be too suspicious. You know it wouldn't look good for Shinra if one of their SOLDIERs disappeared on a mission. We were worried. Are you okay, Spike?"

"Yeah, Zack, I'm okay."

Another voice. Sephiroth. Cloud had not even heard him approach. "Did you find anything interesting? This place... seems familiar somehow."

"Nothing, sir. Old records, meeting notes, budget calculations... I could hardly make out anything else, everything was censored, struck through with black. No wonder the Turks just left this stuff here."

"I... see." Sephiroth said. He didn't seem particularly concerned.

They left the Shinra Mansion basement and continued with the mission. Tifa guided them up the pass to the reactor, but when they reached the rickety bridge, Cloud suggested that they take a different path. To his surprise, they listened. The natural Mako fountain was beautiful. The infantrymen said so, too.

 _You lied..._

Nibelheim burned again.

 _Traitor._

* * *

Cloud's alarm went off. First there was the gentle sound of jazz over the radio, then it got louder, and then there was the beeping.

Cloud slept through it.

* * *

This time, Cloud waited patiently at the inn until Zack, Sephiroth, and the others were asleep. Then he woke Vincent, who happily agreed to help him reduce the mansion to rubble. They torched the basement and made it look like a dragon attack. It was hard work, but Cloud was pleased as he lay back down in the soft bed in his own room back at the inn.

Zack shook him awake roughly. "Hey, wake up! The General's about to order us to leave without you. Didn't you hear when he said he wouldn't wake you up in the morning if you stayed out late? Hurry."

Cloud watched as Sephiroth stood in front of the ruins of the mansion, looking vexed. Probably he was trying to reassure the terrified townspeople that, yes, he and his men were here to take care of the monsters, even ones as fearsome as this, the situation was completely under control, and that they should remain calm while the SOLDIERs would go investigate the reactor.

He had them convinced in no time. Sephiroth's charisma was legendary. Everything would be alright. Their fear had melted away and now they were asking to take photos. Cloud made it into the picture right as the flash went off. The photographer was upset and was about to yell about how he'd ruined the shot... it would be all blurry now... but they'd already begun the hike up the mountain.

They all went into the reactor this time. Cloud was surprised, this was different. Sephiroth had ordered them to come with him, saying it was too dangerous for any of them to remain outside alone. He'd also... suggested politely... that those without the proper clearance... forget... any industrial secrets they might find. Cloud and Zack guided the blindfolded troopers and a very irate Tifa carefully across the narrow catwalks high above the Mako.

The valves, when opened, made the same anguished creaking sound as they always had as the monsters in the pods were released to die on the cold metal floor. Sephiroth noticed the great big 'Jenova Project' sign over the door just as he always did. And then the SOLDIERs escorted their guests, who were relieved to remain ignorant, back outside the reactor. Then they went looking for the dragon.

Cloud felt like he was being watched.

 _There was no dragon, was there?_

They split into two teams to cover more ground. Tifa and Sephiroth would go one way; Cloud, Zack, and the infantrymen would check in a different direction. It made sense. Each group would have a local guide and enough power to survive a fight with the target. Cloud was really happy with how things were going this time. Now he had a chance to get to Jenova before Sephiroth could. Maybe if he could destroy her... He just had to ditch Zack and then...

He couldn't leave Zack behind. It just wasn't... possible. He couldn't think of anything to tell his friend, who looked at him with confusion, curiosity, and concern as he followed him back to the reactor.

 _So, something else, then? Show me._

They went through the 'Jenova' door. Zack seemed about to demand an explanation, but he grew pale when he saw the thing in the tank. Cloud readied the fire spell that would reduce Jenova to ashes. Zack was right beside him, doing the same. There were no screams from the monster as it was incinerated, no resistance, no response. Its glowing green-blue eyes remained locked on Cloud's own, staring until the very end.

It should have mattered. Destroying Jenova should have mattered. Cloud remembered, all too clearly... what Sephiroth had said before...

 _...Orders to take the Planet back..._

He didn't say that this time.

* * *

Cloud was starting to believe that maybe there was such a thing as fate, after all. Maybe some events could not be changed, some things were just destined to happen. So far he hadn't come up with anything that could prevent the burning of Nibelheim and everything that came after. Sometimes his mother survived, sometimes he and Zack escaped the lab. When that happened, Cloud watched the dream as it progressed farther into its alternate future. Sometimes Zack and Aeris didn't die. But always, the town burned, Cloud made it to Midgar and joined AVALANCHE, they chased Sephiroth all the way across the Planet, confronted him deep in the crater... and won. Every time, they won. Holy always appeared before Meteor fell. Perhaps that was also fate.

 _Wake up._

* * *

The sun shone brightly through the window. Cloud was late for work. Not technically, since he kept his own hours, but people were depending on him. He heard the busy sounds of breakfast being prepared below as the first patrons shuffled into the Seventh Heaven. It smelled so good. He raced downstairs, grabbed some french toast from the pan, apologized to Tifa, who just shook her head and smiled, and took off out the door to his bike and his first delivery of the day.

It was a spool of cable, the thick kind meant to carry power over long distances. In time, with the work of many well-meaning people, it would bring electricity from the wind turbines to the city, to re-establish a communications network that would let them ask how the rest of the world was doing.

There were lots of spools of cable to haul. It was hot in the wastes. Cloud's idealism suffered. He should have remembered to bring water with him. He would have remembered if he hadn't slept so late.

Finally... thankfully... he had delivered the last spool of the day. It really was hot out here. Heat shimmered over the sandy ground as he headed home.

* * *

He should have made it back to the city by now. The sun was setting, he would be able to see the stars soon. Stars... above Midgar. People might have paid quite a lot of gil to see that if they'd believed it possible. Even children would have laughed at that idea. The cost... had been too high.

Normally the wastes cooled down quickly at night, but Cloud was still damnably hot. And apparently lost. Something was wrong with his bike, too. He checked the dash. Out of fuel, running on empty. He should have filled up the tank this morning. This was not a good day. He didn't know how to navigate by the stars. Zack had only known the constellations that could be seen from Gongaga, nearly on the other side of the Planet. It didn't help. Cloud sighed deeply and started walking the bike back the way he'd come, following his own tire tracks. He cursed his luck.

 _Or is it... fate?_

Cloud didn't remember how he got back to the construction site, feeling sick and burning up inside. He remembered the dreams, instead.

* * *

It must have been the heat that brought him back to Nibelheim, to the flames in his mind. Cloud barely had to check, he'd seen it over and over. No one had survived this time. At least he knew now that things could happen differently, sometimes. Well, if he was here, he might as well keep trying to change it.

 _So, how does it feel?_

They'd just made it to the town gates. Very soon, Sephiroth was going to ask him that. And then he'd ask about Sephiroth's parents, because he had no tact whatsoever. Maybe this time he wouldn't do that. General Sephiroth had bristled at the way Zack had addressed him on the transport. MISTER Sephiroth. Had Zack just been out of line? No, Zack and Sephiroth had been friends, they'd spoken casually to each other before. Maybe because... the war in Wutai was over, troops had been withdrawn, the media was already focused on the future prosperity the hard-won peace would bring. Shinra wouldn't want Sephiroth, who was basically a living embodiment of the brutality of war, in the spotlight now. So they'd sent him on a mission far beneath his ability, to a town in the middle of nowhere. He probably resented it.

The Cloud who had saved the world knew that war was hell. He'd heard that Wutai had been especially bad. Zack had fought in Wutai, but he'd never shared those memories with Cloud. The things General Sephiroth must have seen, must have done... if even some of the stories were true...

 _Estuans interius_

After all that, someone should have seen it coming. Very little time had passed between the end of the war in Wutai and the beginning of the nightmare in Nibelheim. Sephiroth wouldn't have needed another push over the edge caused by the trauma of discovering his origins. He wouldn't have needed to be manipulated by Jenova to do what he did at Nibelheim. The war had never ended for him.

 _Ira vehementi_

It was dangerous to try to understand the enemy.

"Cloud! Gaea to Cloud!" Zack was waving a hand in front of his face. "You doing alright? You zoned out for a while there. You're nervous about coming back? It's okay, you don't have to prove yourself alone. I'll tell everyone what a great guy you are."

Zack was such a good friend.

Later, everything happened the way it always had. At least Vincent had evacuated the town.

* * *

The next time, there are no flames. Nibelheim is still standing, doomsday averted. How? Cloud tries to play it back. What changed? Did he do something right? He's desperate to know! But Hojo has other plans for him.

After they escape, Zack and Cloud head for Midgar. They ask the questions they always do to catch up on the times. That's when Cloud spots the difference. Nibelheim didn't burn this time because... another town did, instead.

He should be at least a little relieved, right? His hometown is safe. But as he watches the rest of the dream unfold, he becomes less sure. The end is still the same. AVALANCHE fights Sephiroth in the Northern Cave and defeats him. Holy deflects Meteor and humanity is spared. So much is still destroyed. It doesn't feel like the Planet has really been saved.

* * *

There's another thing Cloud can do. He's done it a few times already, and this time no one could possibly expect it. He's been here so many times, now. He's quite confident.

The dragon's wing makes a dent in the truck's roof as it lands too close. Zack, Sephiroth, and Cadet Strife step out of the vehicle prepared for battle. Sephiroth is still assessing the situation when Cloud grabs the Buster Sword and slashes him from behind. He looks back as he falls to the ground.

Cloud knows that surprised look. Sephiroth is only ever surprised when he dies.

Cloud doesn't get to see the rest of this alternate timeline. The last thing he sees is the rage on Zack's face as his friend wrests the sword from his grasp and raises it overhead...

* * *

Everything is blurry, and cold, and white. Cloud panics for a moment and thrashes about. No, no! He's back in the lab again...

"Cloud! You're awake!" Tifa's voice. It's the best thing he's ever heard in his life. "It's safe here. You're going to be okay."

He recognizes where he is: the new hospital outside of Edge. Cloud has made deliveries here, but he hasn't been a patient before. It's a nicer place than he expected.

"How long was I out?" Cloud asks.

Tifa doesn't say anything right away. She just looks worried.

"A long time, Cloud. The heatstroke was really bad. I didn't think you would make it."

 _After a long sleep..._

"How long, Tifa? Please, tell me."

 _...the time..._

"Three weeks."

 _...is now._

He hadn't realized how exhausting it would be to sit up. The dizziness hits him all at once, and then he's back down on the bed and it's dark.

* * *

He's back in Nibelheim. Oh joy.

Cloud Strife, SOLDIER Second Class, is sitting in the truck with Zack, bumping along the wretched road, while the windshield wipers screech against the heavy rain. Zack's uniform looks different. Sephiroth is nowhere to be seen.

Cloud realizes he's just said something without really noticing, because Zack is scowling at him.

"I thought you wanted a briefing?"

Cloud's heard it before. He knows why they always come to Nibelheim. To exterminate those monsters. A crash from the roof confirms his suspicions, once again.

Sephiroth isn't at the inn, either. Everything in town is very quiet when Cloud follows Zack on patrol. No one meets their eyes. What is going on? The gates of the Shinra Mansion aren't as rusty as Cloud remembers. There are a few cars parked out back. There's a flagpole. The Shinra flag is at half-mast.

Zack is saying something to him, something about his hometown, and gives him leave to visit family and friends. Cloud walks through town, through familiar streets that he's now seen in flames more often than not. He comes to his house, he sees his mom. He's glad to see her, but he has to ask.

"What is today? Why is the flag...?"

He's never received a look like the one she gives him. She answers the question, though. "It was five years ago, today..."

...It was a day of mourning for his childhood hero, Sephiroth, who had died in battle in Wutai.

This was unbelievable. If they only knew... if they only knew what Sephiroth would do, had done, they'd never mourn him. But there was no way to say that here.

No one burned Nibelheim that time. Cloud watched as the dream went on. He and Zack never became good friends, but they never ended up in the lab, either. Later, Cloud went back to Midgar to visit his childhood friend, SOLDIER First Class Tifa Lockhart. Tifa convinced him to rebel against SOLDIER from the inside. They joined AVALANCHE, chased Sephiroth halfway across the Planet, defeated him at the Northern Cave, and saved the world again.

What was Cloud supposed to do? What would it take to change the past? To save the Planet for good? Apparently it didn't even matter when or where Sephiroth died. He'd always come back, his will stronger than death.

* * *

Tifa visits him in the hospital. "The doctor says you'll be able to come home tomorrow as long as you don't overdo it."

"..." What was Cloud supposed to do? They said he needed rest, but what he really needed was a break from the dreams...

Tifa must have seen something in his eyes. When he gazed back at her, he saw it in hers, too... the same haunted look.

"Remember when we talked a few weeks back about... changing the past?" Clearly, she hadn't wanted to tell him this while he was still recovering. She must be really worried.

No, Tifa, don't...

"I hadn't considered what I would do differently in a long time. I've tried so hard to focus on the future, to be an example for the others to follow. Then... I couldn't stop myself from thinking about it. There are things I would change, if I could."

Don't say it, don't make it true...

But Tifa continues. "I dream about it every night. I can fix some of my regrets, but some things never seem to change. It's hard to wake up afterward."

"Which part never changes?" Cloud has a horrible feeling that he knows the answer already.

"It's really strange. What happens at the beginning never seems to affect the end at all. You, me, our friends, AVALANCHE... we always fight against Sephiroth in the crater. We should win, we did win. But the dream always ends right there, before the outcome of the fight is certain, and then I just don't know."

Cloud had expected, feared that Tifa's dream would be the same as his. Was that even rational? He had no idea right now. He and Tifa were in danger.

 _Then it's no problem if you protect her._

He was too shaken to comfort Tifa the way he wanted.

* * *

Cloud was afraid now. This mental battle of attrition... it was a familiar tactic Sephiroth had used against him in the past. Successfully. If Sephiroth wanted to come back again, and fight, and if he wasn't just messing around like Cloud suspected he'd been doing last time, after Geostigma... Cloud wasn't sure he could stop him. And Sephiroth would know that.

* * *

Cloud had gotten better at controlling his dreams, since they never left him alone. He'd been able to see more possible outcomes and act to change them in bigger ways. Things just kept getting more bizarre though, even when he hadn't intentionally done anything. He was pretty sure he hadn't actually been asleep sometimes.

It was a beautiful stormy night as he followed the little light up the mountain. It was far below him, moving so slowly, so weakly... it was a good target. He picked his moment and dropped out of the sky, a dive with deadly force behind it.

 _That would be our monster..._

His prey had emerged from the vehicle he'd been about to rip to shreds. They were going to challenge him! Good. He liked to play with his food.

Cloud was the dragon this time? Seriously? He knew how this went. It had never gone differently. Still, he was not prepared for the agony when Masamune pierced his scaled hide. And again. As the light faded in Cloud's eyes, Sephiroth strode towards him to deliver the killing blow. He was... smiling. Sephiroth never would have cared enough about a dragon to even take pleasure in killing one; such things were beneath him. So... he must have known...

That dream ended there.

Then there was the one where everything turned out just fine. They'd gone to Nibelheim and nothing terrible happened. It was a normal mission, they fought some monsters, they inspected the reactor, nothing was wrong. Tifa was really impressed with Cloud. Zack was his usual cheerful self. Sephiroth hadn't acted cold towards the townspeople; Instead, he'd agreed to every photo request and signed as many autographs as he was asked to. He never snapped, the town never burned. They went back to Costa del Sol by helicopter. The view was so fantastic that Cloud forgot to be motion sick.

He wasn't sure which dream was more unlikely, that one or the one with the dragon. Likely... unlikely... maybe that idea was important. Which of the dreams about Nibelheim that Cloud had experienced now was the most likely? Which ones would probably play out more often than the others? And which would never happen? Cloud hoped to Gaea that the dragon one wasn't the true reality.

* * *

He tried to remember the all the dreams, but there were so many of them.

Cloud read the papers in the library. Sephiroth was there, reading with him. No, Sephiroth had come down there later, after Zack had been looking for them... Or maybe Sephiroth had interrupted Cloud to ask him...

 _Did you find anything interesting? This place... seems familiar somehow._

"Nothing, sir."

Sephiroth clearly wasn't buying it. He smirked.

 _I...see._

* * *

 _Show me._

Cloud readied the fire spell that would reduce Jenova to ashes. Zack was right beside him, doing the same. The thing floating in the tank stared with narrowed eyes, gazing past them to something beyond.

Cloud turned around to face the threat he sensed behind him. There was nothing. He turned back to finish the spell, to incinerate Jenova.

He raised his hand towards Zack instead.

* * *

In the dream when he had decided to kill the General, Cloud had moved fast. There was no way Sephiroth could have expected this attack. It was almost as fast as Omnislash.

The Buster Sword shattered against the shimmering force of a Wall spell that Cloud hadn't even seen. It had to have been cast beforehand... he knew that the duration was short...

* * *

 _What I have shown you is reality, what you remember... that is the illusion._

Cloud wished he hadn't remembered that line.

He figured it out. How long had Sephiroth been watching his dreams? From the beginning?

Had it even been his own idea, his wish to change his past, to prevent all that pain, to keep the ones he cared for safe, to save the Planet from Sephiroth for good so that he could settle down and live a peaceful life at last?

"Yes, it was your idea."

The voice wasn't just in his head anymore.

Sephiroth continued. "It was one of the best ideas you've ever had. You were always so full of regrets, since you were so helpless."

Cloud wasn't going to give up yet. "So, you have no regrets yourself? Hasn't anything ever happened that you would change?"

"No. Gods make their own destiny. I choose what reality is, for every soul."

"But then, why bother showing me, tormenting me with all those different dreams? Why let me think I ever had control? What was the point? Was it just a sick game to you?"

"You misunderstand. You were the one who showed me this." Sephiroth gestured at something but Cloud couldn't see what it was. "That so many outcomes actually exist. That it is possible to change memories of the past into reality, not just illusion. That such dreams can, in fact, be controlled... and every single person has them."

Cloud supposed it was true. He'd learned to change things enough to see what might happen differently. He just hadn't found the chain of events he'd wanted to make real. He hadn't thought that someone else might be able to do the same... and his dreams hadn't always been his own even at the best of times... Sephiroth had learned too, by watching him.

"Thank you, Cloud. You always bring me the best gifts."

"But the dream always ended the same way. I saw it. We defeated you! Every time!"

"Since when do you see everything? You saw only what you wanted to, and even that was too much for you."

Cloud didn't believe that. While looking for the future he hoped to have, he'd seen plenty of things he hadn't wanted to. The many times Nibelheim burned, the times another town had burned instead. All the times Sephiroth had dangled him over the Mako pit, skewered on the end of Masamune. The times he and Zack did not escape the lab. Over and over again, though, he'd also seen a future that was familiar to him, in which a very confused Cloud told his story to his friends at the Kalm Inn and they went on to save the world.

* * *

Everything went as it always had. Cloud joined AVALANCHE and they traveled across the Planet together, becoming friends along the way, fighting for the future. They won against Sephiroth at the crater, escaped in the Highwind, and watched from there as the Lifestream gathered and sped towards Midgar.

This time, they had come just a little too late. Holy only partially deflected Meteor. Sephiroth's plan succeeded.

Of course Cloud hadn't looked carefully at the end of the dreams. He was trying to prevent all of that, the details didn't matter. They would matter to Sephiroth though...

 _The small things were easy to think of and easy to fix._

* * *

"This is reality, and now it always will be." Sephiroth was smiling again. Cloud hated that.

"Do you know how long eternity is, Cloud? The cosmos is vast. It will take a long time to get anywhere interesting. I thought I might get bored. But, with what you have shown me, I'll have plenty of entertainment on my long voyage. I truly am grateful."

This was everything Cloud had fought so hard to prevent. This could not be real. To be defeated, after all this...

"Very well, I accept your surrender. What are the terms?"

Cloud wanted this to never have happened. He wanted that desperately.

"Done. But you should have been more specific."

* * *

Cloud fought Sephiroth above the ruins of Midgar.

 _What I want, Cloud, is to sail the cosmos with the Planet as my vessel..._

"What will happen to this Planet?"

 _There's nothing you can do._

The rain forgot how to bring salvation.


End file.
